


Student in Shadows

by thetransgirlwhoneverwas



Series: Fictober 2019 [10]
Category: Doctor Who & Related Fandoms, Gallifrey (Big Finish Audio)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-10
Updated: 2019-10-10
Packaged: 2020-12-07 16:55:58
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,163
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20979254
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thetransgirlwhoneverwas/pseuds/thetransgirlwhoneverwas
Summary: Danna wants to teach her prized student a very important lesson: one many fail to learn. Surely if anyone is up to the task, it is Braxiatel.





	Student in Shadows

“Ah, Irving, good of you to finally arrive.” Dannadementara greeted the figure emerging from the TARDIS in front of her.

“Not my fault this time, Danna, I-” he started.

“That’s “Commander” to you, Irving,” Danna interrupted.

“Of course, Commander,” Irving Braxiatel corrected himself. “Not my fault this time, Commander, I ran afoul of a time storm due to some...interference on my TARDIS thanks to my broth-”

“I’m not interested in your excuses, Irving,” Danna chided him. “Only your attention. Are you ready for today’s lesson?”

“Does it matter if I say no?” Braxiatel asked, only half rhetorically.

“No,” Danna answered bluntly. “Follow me.”

The two walked down the corridor of Danna’s private training facility. The walls were bare, and they walked for so long Braxiatel lost track of where they were, due in part to the automatic treadmills built into the floor. The facility was designed so that nobody there would have any idea where they were within it, save for Danna of course. Nobody knew what anyone’s lesson would entail, and nobody knew which room they would be entering. The surprise and uncertainty helped train cadets for the unexpected. That was the theory anyway. Braxiatel suspected that Danna simply enjoyed disorientating her students. He wasn’t entirely wrong.

“So, how are you other projects coming along?” Danna asked, polite conversation distracting Braxiatel to disorient his sense of direction further. Also she simply enjoyed talking to him. He was a fascinating pupil. “Are your political ambitions playing out? Are my lessons helping, Irving?”

“Naturally, Commander,” Braxiatel responded. “I am already getting involved in debates about matters of state, and sometimes my views are even listened to! I’ll be Imperator in no time.”

“Well, when you do have the entire universe under your thumb, do remember to come visit me occasionally,” Danna laughed with him. “I do so like to see my students succeed, and I’m sure it will be lonely in whatever hovel you exile me for my crimes against your pride.”

“Oh, I’m sure it will never come to that,” Braxiatel laughed. “Military execution is more my style anyway, I’d never deprive you that honour.”

“Oh, of course, much more noble of you,” Danna chuckled back. “Anyway, we’re here. The lesson shall begin.”

“Of course, Commander,” Braxiatel stood to attention. “I look forward to learning whatever you have to teach me.”

“Oh, you young flatterer, Irving,” Danna laughed again, before clearing her throat. “Now, to start, identify the species.”

“It does not matter, surely,” Brax answered, not quite sure of his answer. “Identifying the subject personalises it, making it that much harder to not develop sympathy.”

“Oh, Irving,” Danna shook her head. “If you have to depersonalise something in order to avoid sympathy for a subject you are further behind than I thought.”

“Oh, o-of course,” Brax hastened to correct himself, loathe to disappoint his mentor. “Subject is a Dalek, relatively early in their history, judging by casing, most likely between 700 and 800 years after genesis.”

“Good,” Danna noted. “This Dalek has a piece of information. I want you to extract it. I shall not instruct you how, but I shall be taking notes. You may begin.”

Danna pressed a button and the force field around the Dalek lifted, though it remained chained in place. It immediately started to scream at them.

“RELEASE ME OR YOU WILL BE EXTERMINATED! YOU ARE AN ENEMY OF THE DALEKS! YOU ARE INFERIOR!”

Braxiatel said nothing. He took a laser cutter from the table beside him, and in a decisive yet slow motion, burned through the Dalek’s eyestalk.

“AAAAAAAAAGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHH! MY VISION IS IMPAIRED!”

“Very good,” Danna nodded. “Don’t start with questions, immediately let them know that you are willing and able to administer pain.”

“Now then, Dalek,” Brax said finally. “You have something I wish to know.”

“YOU WILL BE EXTERMINATED!”

“Not telling? Fine.”

Braxiatel took the laser cutter up again and burned an incision at the base of the upper dome of the casing. Once he had cut through, he flipped the dome off, exposing the mutant inside. 

“Good choice of target,” Danna said.

The mutant looked at him with it’s one pulsating eye, filled with nothing but hatred. It was all it knew. It was all any Dalek knew. It sickened Brax, and so he turned the laser cutter to maximum heat and drove it straight into the creature’s eye. Its scream rattled the table beside them.

“Careful, Irving,” Danna said calmly, showing no signs of discomfort.

“I understand, Commander,” Brax retorted.

“Do you?” Danna responded, cool as anything.

Brax took the cutter again and sliced off three of the tentacles protruding from the Dalek’s body. It screamed again.

“I’ve robbed you of your sight, and complex movement, and you know I can do a lot more than that!” Braxiatel threatened the creature that barely looked like a living thing anymore. “You will tell me what I want to know, or you will suffer more than you can possibly imagine.”

To his shock, however, the creature’s gurgled screams turned to a different sound. Strained, but not crying out. Danna frowned, and Braxiatel started to lose patience. It was laughter. The blind, defenseless, immobile Dalek was laughing at him.

“Da...leks...do not...imagiiiiiiine…”

Brax growled and cut through another tentacle. The laughter did not stop. He growled again and drove the cutter straight into the creature’s burned eye socket. The laughter grew louder, more strained, closer to screams, but the hateful being would not stop laughing at him.

“Irving,” Danna warned, but Braxiatel ignored her.

“You will tell me!” he shouted, and thrust the cutter deep into the mutant. It let out a short scream, that turned into slow, raucous laughter that set all of Braxiatel’s teeth on edge, then stopped. Braxiatel took a few steps back and dropped the cutter. It had gotten to him. It had gotten under his skin and he had killed it. He had failed Danna’s test.

“Hmm,” she muttered. “I must say, Irving, I’m disappointed.”

“I...I’m sorry, Commander,” Brax stammered. “Let me try again, please, next time I won’t-”

“This lesson is over, Irving,” Danna interrupted curtly.

“B...but...what was it?” he asked. “What I was supposed to find out? What did it know?”

“You failed to get that information, Irving,” Danna did not look at him, only began to stride away. “You shall just have to wonder.”

Braxiatel hung his head. As much as he was ashamed of himself for losing control, that was nothing compared to the shame he felt for disappointing his mentor. Danna walked away, disappointed. There had been no information to glean. A Dalek would never break under interrogation, she knew that. The lesson she had hoped to impart was that of humility: that it was possible to perform correctly, do everything right, and still fail. Her student had not learned that lesson. And her intuition told her that, despite his immense potential and her high expectations, he never would.


End file.
